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The Office Of Government Ethics Trolled Trump Over His Famous “Loyalty Dinner” WIth Comey

By Koh Mochizuki

16 minutes ago

The Office of Government Ethics appeared to have had enough with Trump after he asked for the ousted FBI Director James Comey’s ‘loyalty’ at a private dinner.

So when the independent agency under the jurisdiction of the president tweeted about ‘loyalty,’ many couldn’t help but wonder if it was a direct jab.The tweet appeared to school the president. “Public service is a public trust, requiring employees to place loyalty to the Constitution, the laws, and ethical principles above private gain.”

The Internet seemed to enjoy the direct aim of the public service announcement.

This also wasn’t the first time the ethics agency skewered the president. Obama appointee and head of the agency Walter Shuab criticized Trump’s plan to separate himself from his business as “wholly inadequate.” Shaub said, “Stepping back from running his business is meaningless from a conflict of interest perspective.”

According to Comey’s account of the ‘loyalty’ conversation a week after Trump’s inauguration, the then-FBI director told the NY Times that he could only give Mr. Trump ‘honesty’ and did not pledge loyalty. And we all know what happened a few months later.

For any good organization to function, there needs to be some type of internal accountability. Government agencies especially need some type of internal affairs or ethics committee to ensure that everything is on the up and up and people in positions of power aren’t (gasp) abusing their power. I know, it seems crazy that anyone would do such a thing because humans have such incredible track records of doing the right thing, always, but ethics committees are a necessity.

So when word broke out about Donald Trump’s alleged connections with Russia, that gave U.S. Intelligence agencies cause for alarm to go and investigate how deep of a relationship Trump has with the Russian government – and it turns out it’s pretty freaking deep.

But the thing is, if an official investigation is being launched on the former reality star turned U.S. President, then it needs to be handled the correct way. Meaning you can’t have people who are in Trump or his opponent’s pocket. This means it needs to be left up to the bipartisan House Ethics Committee.

Which is exactly why that same committee is investigating Republican Devin Nunes.

Nunes is chairman to the House Permanent Select Committee On Intelligence and was previously part of the investigation into Trump’s ties with Russia. However, after it was alleged he made a late-night trip to the White House to obtain classified information on how Trump transition team members were “unmasked,” he’s been asked to step down from the case.

For Nunes, being removed from the Russia investigation is due to a strong conflict of interest. In this case, the Republican seemingly illegally divulged classified information to Ryan and Trump.

Had Nunes followed protocol, he would have briefed his Democratic Counterpart on the Ethics Committee, Adam Schiff. The committee’s basically ruling that Nunes can’t be trusted with classified information, so now the Ethics Committee won’t be investigating Trump’s tied with Russia. That job will be left to the Senate Intelligence Committee.

The Ethics Committee is supposed to be a completely bipartisan political watchdog.

With an equal number of Democrats and Republicans making up the committee, the group also possesses subpoena power, meaning that they can investigate exactly what information Nunes divulged to Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and Donald Trump after he briefed them on March 22nd.

For Nunes, the scandal’s probably more embarrassing than this ’91 Highschool yearbook photo of him.

However, as Shaun King and others are pointing out, we have a Republican President and majority Republican Senate and Congress. So maybe it’s the fact that he did something illegal that torpedoed his political career?

Some are saying that this points to further proof that Russia meddled in our election.

BREAKING: Devin Nunes steps down sayin’ he wants to spend more time with his fellow Russian conspirators. #TrumpRussia